The invention relates to DC-to-DC power converters, also referred to as “DC/DC converters” herein.
A typical DC/DC converter converts a DC input voltage to a different (e.g., lower) DC output voltage. A DC/DC converter may be fully regulated, semi-regulated or non-regulated. If a DC/DC converter is regulated, its output voltage is compared to a reference voltage, and closed loop control maintains the output voltage at a stable value. If a DC/DC converter is semi-regulated, the output voltage is maintained in a small range according to the input voltage or applied load. If a DC/DC converter is non-regulated, the output voltage is a fixed ratio of the input voltage.
Closed loop control of DC/DC converters is commonly realized by an analog controller. The output voltage is scaled and the result is compared to a reference voltage, and analog circuitry compensates the closed loop. Analog closed loop control is simple and mature. However, any given implementation may be relatively inflexible (difficult to change or tune to meet operating goals) and may require a number of discrete components that consume system resources such as circuit board space.